Just Another Day at the Office
by Wilusa
Summary: A day in the life of the 1991 DS's Sheriff Patterson.


  
DISCLAIMER: _Dark Shadows_ and its canon characters are the property of Dan Curtis Productions; no copyright infringement is intended.  
  
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_9:00 a.m._  
  
Sheriff George Patterson was scowling as he skimmed the latest surveillance reports. The officers assigned to watch Barnabas Collins' property wanted to make it appear they were accomplishing something. So every night they used more words to say what could have been said in three: No suspicious activity.  
  
Patterson swore under his breath. He knew Collins wasn't really in Boston, on a "combined business and pleasure trip." Staying with friends, at an address and phone number Willie Loomis had conveniently misplaced.  
  
He was sure the enigmatic Englishman was a vampire, and had done away with Joe Haskell when Haskell foolishly confronted him. But knowing it and being able to prove it were two different things.  
  
At times like this, Patterson reflected, he almost wished he'd never heard of the Collins family.  
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Someone tapped politely on the open door of his office. He looked up.  
  
_Scratch that last thought._  
  
"Elizabeth!" He favored her with one of his rare smiles. "And Miss Winters. I heard you were back. It's good to see you. Come in, sit down."  
  
His eyes narrowed as Vicki, unasked, closed the door behind them. So this was more than a social call.  
  
After an awkward exchange of pleasantries, he saw Vicki cast a questioning glance at Elizabeth. The older woman nodded.  
  
Vicki took a deep breath. "Sheriff. You already know some very strange things have happened in Collinsport in recent months. I don't have to spell them out. Would you agree that at this point, almost nothing is beyond belief?"  
  
He weighed the question, and said carefully, "Yes. I would agree with that."  
  
"Then I'll tell you where I really was during my so-called vacation.  
  
"To begin with, we had been conducting a seance at Collinwood. That apparently opened some kind of portal. I was transported to the year 1790, and the governess from that era was transported here!"  
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Patterson choked. But when he caught his breath, he saw the sincerity in her eyes. And remembered the bizarre behavior of her replacement--a young woman who had apparently never seen a car.  
  
"All right," he said hoarsely. "I believe you. May I ask...since you're here, can I assume the other woman was returned to 1790?"  
  
"Yes."  
  
"That's good. Go on."  
  
"Thank you for taking me seriously." She twisted her hands in her lap, groping for words. "Sheriff, I discovered something in 1790. Something Mrs. Stoddard and I both think you should know."  
  
He waited expectantly.  
  
"You're familiar with the story of Josette DuPres, who came here in 1790 and died tragically on Widows' Hill?"  
  
"Yes," he said softly. "I've heard that story all my life."  
  
"You probably aren't aware I look almost exactly like Josette. I knew that before I traveled to the past. There's a portrait of her in the Old House."  
  
He pursed his lips. "No, I never knew what she looked like." He studied Vicki with new interest.  
  
"Before the time travel experience," she continued, "I assumed I was the reincarnation of Josette. Now I'm not so sure.  
  
"What I really want to tell you is that _you_ bear just as strong a resemblance to Josette's father, Andre DuPres." Twin spots of color burned on her cheeks.  
  
Patterson settled back in his chair, letting his normally impassive features relax into a smile. "So...that proves it. My family has preserved a tradition that we're descended from Andre DuPres, from a servant he made pregnant during that brief stay at Collinwood. I've always been proud of it, wrong side of the bed or not.  
  
"Of course--you knew about that, Elizabeth! Thank you for telling Miss Winters I'd want to know."  
  
Both women appeared on the verge of saying more.  
  
He forestalled them. He said wistfully, "So, Miss Winters, my ancestor had a daughter who looked like you. I suppose, if I had a daughter, that's what my own would look like. I wish I did have one."  
  
Elizabeth cleared her throat. He turned to see her eyes brimming with tears. "George, that's what we came to tell you. You _do_ have a daughter!"  
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He stared at her, open-mouthed. At a loss for words.  
  
But memories came flooding back. A long-ago summer romance. After which he, God forgive him, had jilted her. Her father had been determined to coax him into the Collins family business. And he had feared that if he stayed with her, he wouldn't have the strength to resist.  
  
"It's true, George," Elizabeth was saying. "When Vicki told me about those resemblances, I knew there was a chance she could be your child--if she was also mine. So I had DNA testing done. She is mine. _Ours._"  
  
He whispered, "Oh, my God." Stared at Vicki, who was pale and tense now.  
  
"Sheriff," she said quickly, "I'm not asking for anything. And I don't expect you to take Mrs.--my _mother's_ word for this. If you're interested in knowing, you can have testing done too--"  
  
"There's no need." He got to his feet and moved around the desk. "Miss Winters..._Vicki_. If you want a father, you have one!" She gave a wordless cry, and he gathered her into his arms.  
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Five minutes later, still clutching Vicki, he looked over her head at her quietly weeping mother. "Elizabeth. I can understand why you didn't tell me. I'll never forgive myself. But why did you let her grow up in an orphanage?"  
  
"That wasn't my choice." She wiped her eyes, steadying her voice with an effort. "Father told me she'd be adopted, have a loving two-parent home. But then _he_ apparently couldn't let her go. I was never given anything to sign, and I was too naive to realize there should have been papers.  
  
"Father died unexpectedly. I thought my baby had been adopted, and no one else knew anything about her."  
  
Rising, she stretched out a tremulous hand to stroke Vicki's hair. "I...I hope it's not too late to make up for lost time."  
  
Father and daughter each freed an arm, and pulled her into their embrace. Smiling through her own tears, Vicki murmured, "It's not."  
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***  
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_1:00 p.m.  
  
_Struggling to put his newfound daughter out of his mind and concentrate on paperwork, Patterson didn't look up when a shadow fell across his desk. "Yes, Jonathan?"  
  
"It's not your deputy, George."  
  
He jerked away with a strangled gasp, almost overturning his chair.  
  
"I'm sorry I startled you." His old friend took a seat, smiling, as Julia Hoffman closed the door. "I'm very much in your debt."  
  
Patterson fought down the wave of panic that threatened to engulf him. In almost his usual flat, emotionless drawl, he said, "It's good to see you again, Michael."  
  
Michael Woodard chuckled. "Why do I doubt your sincerity?" Then he sobered. "George, it really is _me_. The same person I always was."  
  
"I...I can see that." But he couldn't help shooting an accusing look at Dr. Hoffman as she dropped into the other chair. She might at least have warned him.   
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Deep down, he supposed, he had always known what she intended.  
  
She'd convinced him to cover up the vampire incident for the sake of Michael's reputation. At her urging, he'd told everyone the professor had left for New Guinea on an anthropological field trip. And he'd agreed to wait a year before declaring him lost and making some disposition of his house.  
  
Then she'd asked to keep the body, with the stake--harpoon, actually--safely through its heart, in the basement. So she could study it.  
  
Sure as he was that this woman had effected a partial cure for Barnabas Collins, he must have known she'd do more than study her friend Michael Woodard.  
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"Congratulations, Doctor," he said dryly. "I take it Professor Woodard is completely cured?"  
  
"Completely." To her credit, there was no smugness in her voice. "It wasn't easy. I began treatments with the harpoon still in his heart. Judging when to pull it out was crucial. I wanted the cure to be far enough along that Michael wouldn't attack me--yet it was essential he still be a vampire, or he couldn't have survived." She heaved a sigh of relief. "Fortunately, all went well."  
  
Patterson was still grappling with this new reality. "Michael, how did you manage after that? No vampire attacks were reported."  
  
"There weren't any," Woodard assured him. "Julia's treatments had progressed far enough that for the short time I needed it, I was able to subsist on donated blood from the blood bank."  
  
"And because Michael had only briefly craved fresh, warm blood, the cure went quickly," Dr. Hoffman explained. "Sheriff, this is important. Michael has never done anything illegal! Unless you want to prosecute him for assaulting the two of us. And I don't seem to remember anything like that happening."  
  
Patterson gave a good-natured shrug. "Neither do I, Doctor, neither do I."  
  
He knew what was coming next. He wasn't surprised when Woodard glanced at the closed door, then put a hand on his arm and said, "George, there's something else we need to discuss. I have a new perspective on vampirism now. And I'm here today to intercede for Barnabas Collins."  
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An hour later Patterson was close to giving in. He understood that when Collins killed, he had truly been unable to stop himself. That his vampirism was now under control--he was drinking donated blood, and a cure was imminent. Woodard's endorsement carried considerable weight.  
  
Even now, though, one question nagged at him. He fixed Julia with a piercing gaze. "Dr. Hoffman. _What happened to Joe Haskell?_"  
  
The doctor winced. "As you probably suspect, he's dead. But Barnabas didn't kill him.  
  
"In a sense, I did. But I swear I wasn't responsible for my actions! You'll find this hard to believe, but...I was _possessed_. By an eighteenth-century witch."  
  
Patterson closed his eyes. Moaned.  
  
Vampires. Time travel. Possession by an eighteenth-century witch. What next?  
  
"Sheriff?"  
  
He sighed. "I believe you, Doctor. If you were lying, you would have invented a better tale than that.  
  
"Tell your friend Mr. Collins...all is forgiven."  
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***  
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_5:00 p.m.  
  
_Rushing to clear his desk so he could join Elizabeth and Vicki at Collinwood, Patterson was annoyed when yet another visitor knocked on the door. "Come in."  
  
He glanced up at a tall, muscular young man he'd never seen before. "Yes?"  
  
The newcomer straddled a chair. "I understand you've been trying to reach me, Sheriff. I was traveling, and it took a while for my mail to catch up with me.  
  
"But now that I know..." Both fists clenched, and Patterson recognized barely contained fury.  
  
"I'm sorry. Why was I trying to reach you?"  
  
"My sister. My kid sister Tara. She was murdered, her body found in the surf off some cliff called--what was it, Widows' Hill?"  
  
_Oh, Christ._ One of Barnabas Collins' early victims. A relative _would_ show up now, after he'd agreed to let Collins off the hook.  
  
"Have you arrested her killer?"  
  
"Uh, no."  
  
"That's inexcusable, after all this time! If you don't find him and deal with him, I vow _I will_."  
  
"We're doing our best, sir. And here in Collinsport, we don't tolerate anyone's taking the law into his own hands."  
  
The young man was on his feet, headed for the door. "You can't intimidate me!"  
  
Patterson groaned. This one was trouble. "Sir...I don't remember all the particulars of the case. May I ask your name?"  
  
The stranger turned, his hand already on the knob.  
  
He smiled. An insolent smile that showed gleaming white teeth.  
  
"Of course, Sheriff. My name is Jennings. Chris Jennings."  
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(The End)  



End file.
